Martha Kelly Girdler on How to Cultivate More Female Engineers and on Being Part of Etsy's 500% Success Story

Last month, news broke that Etsy increased their female engineer base by nearly 500 percent by changing the way they recruit and develop their female talent. This sort of triple-digit improvement, in less than a year, reimagines a industry previously flanked by a supply problem on the one hand and a well-documented "brogrammer" culture on the other. Now boasting an industry-leading 20 female engineers on a team of 110, Etsy's move to a “Hacker School” model and away from traditional headhunting and pure interview-based evaluations has sent a strong signal to other technology-driven companies: it can be done.

And while 20 out of 110 is no where near 50 percent (it is in fact just over 18 percent), it is a figure that represents a focused effort by Etsy to better represent their user base (which is 80 percent female) and bring diversity to a previously gender-homogenous group. To better understand how Etsy supports and hires from Hacker School beyond the numbers, I sat down with one of its graduates and eventual full-time hires, Martha Kelly Girdler.

I first became a fan of Martha's when we worked together in 2011 and have followed her career ever since. In a sentence: Martha is the real deal and has some of the most insightful, poignant, and real-lived things to say about being a female engineer and how to continue to cultivate more women in the field. You will want to read this interview at least once and share it (hopefully) even more.

Leslie Bradshaw: You participated in Hacker School through the Etsy incubator program. What was your experience there and what was your greatest "takeaway" from the program?

Martha Kelly Girdler: My experience at Hacker School was, and still is, incredible. I came to the program with HTML, CSS and a trivial amount of JS experience. I left as an engineer who writes PHP/JS/Python/C, contributes to open source projects, and is into creating mesh networks with her Raspberry Pi. My biggest takeaway from the program is what it means to be a great engineer. Great engineers are thoughtful and humble. Great engineers are unafraid to ask questions and “open the box” of their applications. Great engineers are completely okay with not knowing everything.

At Hacker School I learned that programming is not so different from writing a great paper or learning a foreign language. The biggest barrier to entry is very conceptual. When you approach programming with an intense willingness to learn, amazing things will happen. You have to be curious and unafraid and you have to be extremely willing to bounce back from failure.

LB: What is it like being a female programmer now? What changes to do expect to see in the next ten years for women in your field?

MKG: It’s ridiculously fun to be a programmer, but at times, there is extra pressure as a female programmer. There are double standards and comments on our appearance, people often assume we’re less skilled than we are, and we have to make the conscious choice of how to discuss these issues. It’s important for women considering a move into programming to know the negative aspects are vastly and completely outweighed by the positive ones. There is such freedom in loving what you do, where you work, and what you work on.

In the next ten years I’m hopeful young women will add “Computer Scientist” or “Software Engineer” to their list of possible careers as easily as “Doctor” or “Veterinarian”. More young women need to be aware this is an option for their future. With organizations like Girls Who Code, Code 2040, and Code Scouts this is becoming a reality. To achieve lasting success, young women need many more role models and mentors.

LB: What sparked your interest in technology?

MKG: In the fourth grade I ducked into the computer lab to escape bullies (hi, bullies!). The lab tech taught me how to use DOS and I sat there for hours until I was able to write a small Star Wars game. Programming was, and still is, a great form of escapism. I can get lost writing a program the same way I get lost in a great book.

LB: What can we do to get more women to pursue careers in technology?

MKG: More women will pursue careers in technology when they see other women pursuing careers in technology. I believe we get there by mentoring, promoting, and giving visibility to more women in technical fields.

LB: What do you like most about what you do?

MKG: I contributed to a product that enabled $895.1 million worth of commerce to be directed toward small businesses in 2012. I think Etsy is a beautiful and effective platform for small businesses to compete with corporations. It’s also a nice side effect that I’m constantly inspired by our leadership and feel lucky to learn from my co workers.

LB: What role does gender play in programming? Relatedly, do men and women approach programming differently?

MKG: There are many different personal approaches to programming. Adding more gender diversity (and diversity in general) can only introduce more solutions to the problems we’re trying to solve. I feel like the culture of programming and what it means to “look like” or “act like” a programmer is changing. Some of the best Software Engineers have English degrees (I have an Art degree). I believe this diversity of thought benefits everyone involved.

LB: Have your experienced the “Brogrammer” culture? If so, how did you navigate it?

MKG: I’ve worked in environments that act completely unaware of having a woman in the room. I’ve been told I was being a “girl” for taking offense to pornographic images in the workplace. I’ve been mistaken for a secretary. I wore my Hacker School T-shirt to dinner and a stranger came up to my husband and asked him how he enjoyed his time there. To navigate it you have to rise above it, and you learn to quickly and firmly correct people. You become extremely conscientious in your work. To quote a favorite book of mine, “There's only one thing that will make them stop hating you. And that's being so good at what you do that they can't ignore you.” (from Ender’s Game)

LB: Who are some other female programmers that we should all have on our radars?

MKG: There is no way I can do this list justice. The women on my radar currently are Hilary Mason, Poornima Vijayashanker, Kate Matsudaira, Neha Narula, Laura Thomson, Garann Means, Julia Grace, and Tess Rinearson.

LB: What role have male and female mentors played in your career?

MKG: Reaching out to mentors has been the best move of my career. Kate Matsudaira has given me her valuable, hard won perspective on life and business. Marc Hedlund (Etsy) is a thoughtful, supportive leader and his sincerity convinced me to apply for Hacker School. Garann Means’ (Etsy) confidence and public speaking inspires me to put myself out there. Adda Birnir and Kate McGee (Skillcrush) inspire me to take more risks. Curtis Chambers (Uber) taught me how to be brave. I’ve learned an unshakable kind of perseverance from you as well, Leslie. Mentors make you believe that nothing is impossible. They have done it, and you will do it too.

LB: Girl, you just made my day with that. Unshakable is something we women need to be, thank you for holding a mirror up and being a amplifying node!

LB: What have been the defining moments of your career? What made them definitive and what did you learn from them?

MKG: My most recent defining moment was standing in front of my peers and teaching them how the JavaScript interpreter creates function objects. I was able to take a really deep dive into the internal constructs of the language. Before the talk, I was completely terrified of public speaking (waking up to panic attacks, terrified), but I was able to face my fear and give a great presentation.

Before that, another defining moment was sitting in my Etsy interview pair-programming on a project with an engineer and having him tell me, “I’ve never had an applicant get this far. We don’t expect people to finish, and you just did.”

LB: What are your favorite languages to code in?

MKG: JavaScript, Python, C

LB: What are three pieces of advice to the women in your field?

1) Take on projects that scare you

2) Above all, trust yourself

3) Reach out to many mentors

LB: When describing Etsy's new approach to recruiting female engineers, Forbes staff writer Meghan Casserly used terms like "double standard", "reverse sexism" and "pinkifying the recruiting process". What is your response to her rather charged choice of words?

MKG: First, "reverse sexism" isn't an actual thing. The term would just be "sexism". Second, the recruitment process was not "pinkified" (for the record, that's a sexist statement) or subjected to double standards. The process was humanized. As it is now we vet more highly qualified candidates. The majority of women hired at Etsy from my batch of Hacker School turned down offers at other companies (some at more senior positions). We chose to work at Etsy.